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| | Saturday, August 19 Bodine holds off Waltrip for first Busch win | |||||
| Associated Press BROOKLYN, Mich. -- The slogan on the cover of the NASCAR Busch Series media guys reads: "Anyone can win." Todd Bodine now knows it's true. Bodine, who had gone winless in 69 races dating back to 1997, held off Michael Waltrip to win the NAPAonline.com 250 by .192 seconds at Michigan Speedway on Saturday. "It's about time," Bodine shouted as he climbed from his Phillips 66 Chevrolet. Did the winless streak bother him? "Not as much as it would have if I was younger," Bodine said. "But I think about that every week. We've been running with (the leaders) every week, when we didn't have something happen. "We never gave up. We knew we had a championship team." Still, it wasn't easy. Bodine and his crew disagreed about tires on the high-banked 2-mile track. He felt he needed four new ones, but finally made a pit stop on the 74th lap to take on two new tires. "I wasn't nervous, but I was upset," Bodine said. "If I had taken on four tires, I think I'd have pulled away from them. I think we would have pretty much dusted them and put them away." When he came back out, Bodine regained the lead -- passing Waltrip's Chevrolet on lap 118 -- and stayed in front to the end of the 125-lap race. "They were running up on me at the end," Bodine said. "But I knew the only way they were going to pass me was to go under me. This marked the first time the Busch Series had run 125 laps at Michigan. Busch races in the past had only been 100 laps at the speedway. Jeff Burton was third in a Ford and Ward Burton, in a Pontiac, was fourth. "We ran Todd down by running the top, and he did a really good job of watching that," Jeff Burton said. "He saw us catching him on the top, so he moved to the top. And once he moved to the top, it was pretty hard to get by him." Jeff Burton said he enjoyed the side-by-side racing against his brother. "If we had gotten the car to handle a little better we could have gotten them," Ward Burton said. "But that's the way it is every week. The best-handling car ought to win, and Todd had it today." Burton, who started 16th, averaged 162.749 mph during the race which took one hour, 32 minutes, 10 seconds to complete. There was just one caution flag, lasting three laps, for some debris on the backstretch. | ALSO SEE NAPAonline.com 250 results AUDIO/VIDEO   Todd Bodine wins at Michigan Speedway.avi: 1095 k RealVideo: 56.6 | ISDN | T1 Todd Bodine is surprised it took so long to get back to victory lane.avi: 2086 k RealVideo: 56.6 | ISDN | T1   Todd Bodine explains the reason behind taking a two-tire stop.wav: 246 k RealAudio: 14.4 | 28.8 | 56.6 Lynn Bodine says her husband deserved to win the race.wav: 245 k RealAudio: 14.4 | 28.8 | 56.6 Michael Waltrip liked his chances going into the race.wav: 461 k RealAudio: 14.4 | 28.8 | 56.6 Jeff Burton talks chasy set-ups following the race.wav: 202 k RealAudio: 14.4 | 28.8 | 56.6 Mike McLaughlin finished fifth despite off-track distractions.wav: 370 k RealAudio: 14.4 | 28.8 | 56.6 Ward Burton enjoyed racing against good his friend Todd and his brother Jeff.wav: 372 k RealAudio: 14.4 | 28.8 | 56.6 Jeff Gordon had a 'wild' time racing with the Busch guys.wav: 272 k RealAudio: 14.4 | 28.8 | 56.6 | |||||